Freedom and Death Inside the Jail.pdf - The Action Program for ...

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Freedom and Death Inside The Jail
They attract the inmates’ attention and interest by bringing food
and other provisions to them. As expected, the Catholic Church,
being the dominant religion in the country, strongly opposes such
practices and pressures jail officers into banning these “other”
religious organizations from the Jail. If it is any indication of the
Catholic Church’s influence, the Jail has only one chapel—that
of the Catholic Church.
Quezon City Jail is also plagued by fly-by-night NGOs, or organizations
that use inmates to solicit monetary support from
private corporations and funding agencies. They bring food and
medicine to a small number of inmates, take pictures they can
submit as evidence of their “good deed” to the funding agency, and
run away with the money. This modus operandi puts legitimate
organizations in a bad light.
Relationships between volunteers and inmates can get personal
sometimes. There are volunteers who eventually become
an inmate’s common-law wife. Other volunteers feel strongly
against such relationships, especially if the inmate involved is
already married. They feel that such practice puts volunteerism
in the Jail into question.
jaIL CONFLICTS AND THEIR IMPLICATIONS ON JAIL MANAGEMENT
Conflicts among jail officers, inmates, visitors, and volunteers have
created a culture of fear in the community. Both the jail officers
and inmate leaders instill fear among the ordinary inmates to maintain
law and order. Inmates, for example, would rather keep silent
on the malpractices they observe in the Jail lest they court the ire
of the powers-that-be. This practice has resulted in the discriminatory
dispensation of justice - with the lowly but innocent inmates
usually at the receiving end of punishments.
Indeed, jail officers, inmate leaders, ordinary inmates, visitors,
and volunteers know their respective roles in the community. No one
- particularly the jail officers and inmate leaders - complains as
long as their interests are protected. The volunteers choose to go
with the flow as long as they are allowed to implement their programs
for which they get funding assistance from various agencies.
It is a disturbing and alarming situation but the Quezon City Jail
community is thriving in conflict.